Equifax refused to restore his credit score or explain why it dropped to zero, until Go Public started asking questions.
Only then did the company point to its little-known policy: If a credit file sits inactive, the consumer may be labelled “unscoreable” and their score reset to zero. Tregear says the last time he checked, before it disappeared, his score was around a more respectable 700.
Go Public has since found a major flaw in consumer protection rules — that there are no laws or oversight on how credit scores are calculated, leaving credit bureaus to do what they want.
Consumer advocate Geoff White says that gives credit bureaus too much power, with no transparency.
You know what’s funny? Credit scores are a fairly new thing. If you wanted to rent an apartment, all you needed were good references. You couldn’t be denied based off some obscure score that a couple of companies have a monopoly over and can wreck your whole life if THEY mess up with no chance of recovering.
In a world where everything works on debt now, these companies have too much power over people.